UPA-II sought action against 128 groups with ‘Maoist’ links

ET Bureau|

Aug 29, 2018, 11.16 PM IST

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Arun Ferreira, a human rights activist arrested by the Pune police in connection with the Bhima Koregaon case.

The Pune police has claimed that it has got “digital conversations” and other “cyber evidence” to link ten arrested civil rights activists with the Bhima-Koregaon riots case. Some of the accused have been under the scanner since the UPA-II regime.

In December 2012, the then central government had written to all states to take action against persons involved with 128 organisations it had identified having linkages with the CPI (Maoists), said government officials.

Seven of those picked up during countrywide raids on June 6 and August 28 in the Bhima-Koregaon riots case belong to the organisations appearing in the list of 128, said officials. They are Varavara Rao, Sudha Bhardwaj, Surendra Gadling, Rona Wilson, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves and Mahesh Raut.

While Rao is president of the Revolutionary Democratic Front, Bhardwaj is vice president of Indian Association of People’s Lawyers, Gonsalves is former secretary of Maharashtra state committee of CPI (Maoists) and Ferreira is a former member of Maharashtra state committee of CPI (Maoists), said a government officer aware of the investigation being carried out by the Pune police in the Bhima-Koregaon case.

Similarly, Gadling is general secretary of the Indian Association of People’s Lawyers, Wilson is public relations secretary of the Committee for the Release of Political Prisoners and Raut is state convener, Maharashtra, of Visthapan Virodhi Jan Vikas Andolan, said officials.

Although the Pune police did not reveal exact charges against each of the arrested activists, a senior government officer involved in anti-Maoist operation said “what is under investigation in the instant case are the linkages of these individuals with the CPI (Maoists)”. Union state minister for home affairs Hansraj Ahir, however, defended police action.

“I do not want to comment on the action taken by police... police department has free hand to initiate action and it is doing so,” he said in Nagpur on Wednesday.